Test your Memorial Day knowledge with this quiz.
In response to so many just think of this holiday as a 3-day weekend and to encourage reverence of our nation's heroes, the National Moment of Remembrance resolution was passed in 2000, that asks all Americans to take a moment at 3 p.m. local time to stop what they are doing for a moment and reflect and remember.
To learn more, History.com has an informative site about Memorial Day including a few videos.
I've been researching Native American history for my book with the working title of Eternal Spirits, and would like to give a tip of the hat to Ira Hayes from the Pima tribe, who trained as a paratrooper and was nicknamed Chief Falling Cloud. After parachute units were disbanded, he ended up in Iwo Jima and one day gave a hand to his buddies who were raising the flag --captured in this famous photo taken by Joe Rosenthal. Ira is the one on the far left.
Ira Hayes served as an honorable warrior but had trouble adjusting with his unwanted fame and frustration with the living circumstances for his people, as explained in this article. He died at the age of 32 and is buried in Arlington Cemetery.
To learn more about the biographies of the 6 men in this photograph, James Bradley wrote a beautiful book, Flags of our Fathers.
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